Invisible Feathers
by Getemono
Summary: What if she didn't exist? If there was no promise and no one was waiting? But what if Squall remembered it anyways? A SquallXRinoa theme with a very anti-SquallXRinoa storyline.
1. No One's Waiting

Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy VIII.

Chapter One: No One's Waiting

Squall Leonhart panted, searching his inventory for a High Potion. The darkness around him was endless and the far-off stars twinkled ethereally, making a strangely beautiful stage for a fight. He could see every labored breath roll out from his lips, and he knew one more hit would be more than enough to take him down. His gloved fingers searched for the potion. Where was it?

Rinoa took one glance at him and quickly cast a curaga on him. Feeling replenished, he stood proudly, holding his gunblade with a stronger grip. Rinoa's eyes met his and she gave a roguish grin before returning her focus to the battle. Her face shone with the knowledge that victory was almost theirs.

Squall couldn't help but smirk as well. He, too, could see that the Sorceress was losing power. Her weakened stance told him that she didn't have much left in her. So why did she still look so determined even as Zell attacked her with a barrage of punches and kicks?

"You're up, Squall!" Zell called as he bounced into place beside his commander. He flashed a toothy smile before tossing an Aura stone to Squall. It broke over his head, and Squall felt the familiar sensation of warmth spreading throughout his body.

"Right." Squall nodded, taking a deep breath before running towards Ultimecia. His mind played games on him with each frenzied step he took. As he came closer, he noticed that the scowl she'd worn for the entire battle was slowly shifting into a malicious smile, and Squall had to resist the urge to run in the other direction. Zell and Rinoa's cheering faded until there was nothing left of their excited voices. The stars seemed to dim, and Ultimecia's face was so bright, as though she were the light source. His steps became slower and slower, and it took everything to keep going. Soon, his footsteps ceased to fall at all, and Squall found himself trapped in Time. His head thrashed this way and that, willing the rest of his body to follow, but it was in vain. He couldn't budge.

"Commander." Ultimecia purred, walking in slow, elegant strides but still managing to cover distance at an inhuman speed. Her purple lips were stretched in a cold smile as she stretched her long fingers towards his face. He tried to pull away, but his head was frozen. He glared at her spitefully as her hands cupped his face.

"Get your filthy hands off of me." He growled, wishing he could slice her through with the Lionheart. She laughed.

"It's only temporary." She said in that strange, tender voice, so different from her harsh tones at the beginning of their battle. "I have a proposition to make."

"No." He shot. He hated being forced to stare directly at the cruel parody of beauty.

"Don't be so hasty." The words hissed through her lips, pleading for him to consider their meaning. Squall felt a strange sensation spread down his spine, and his heart skipped a beat. He didn't know why. "Do not attack me, attack the small fighter. Rinoa will help you."

"And just why would I do that?" Squall managed to sound fierce through clenched teeth.

"Because, if you attack me, Rinoa vanishes." She leaned in close, and he could taste Winter on her breath. "You see, I made her just for you. Well, I'll admit, it was for my own selfish reasons as well, but you gain more than I do." She gave him a seductive smile.

That was the stupidest thing he'd ever heard. Ultimecia didn't know him, she couldn't just know that creating Rinoa would come in handy. It wasn't like Rinoa had only come into existence when she had approached Squall at the SeeD ball. Squall opened his mouth to protest.

"She's right, Squall." Ultimecia flicked her wrist, and Squall's body turned around to see Rinoa walking out of her frozen stance, her footsteps echoing throughout the vast space surrounding them. Zell still remained frozen and faded behind her. Her head was bent down, her eyes afraid to meet his. He would do anything to wipe the shame off of her face.

"I was made just for you. I'm nothing more than a spell." She'd reached Squall, and she put a hand out to his face, a glum expression on her face. It passed right through him, and she looked ready to cry. "If she dies, I disappear."

Squall was speechless. His knees would have given out on him if he wasn't suspended in Ultimecia's magic. She had to be lying. Ultimecia was playing some sort of trick on him…

"But," Ultimecia told him. "If you attack the fighter, I shall allow you two to stay, to love, forever."

"Please, Squall." Rinoa tried to grab onto Squall, but she kept sliding through. She started to cry. "I don't want to fade. I don't want to be nothing." Her dark eyes locked onto his, pleading for life.

Yes. Of course the answer was yes. How could he let her fade? But he knew yes was the wrong answer. This wasn't the Rinoa he knew. Rinoa wouldn't put her life before Zell's, or before anyone's for that matter. This was just one of Ultimecia's last acts of desperation. He closed his eyes, unable to handle the sobbing Rinoa before him.

"No dice." He said evenly, refusing to look at Rinoa. She'd collapsed to the ground.

"No! Please, Squall, don't!" She screamed. "Please, Squall, please!" But her screams faded into silence. Squall felt Time melting off of his body, and he caught Ultimecia's scandalized face before he blinked, and everything returned to as it was before. He was running at full speed, Rinoa's and Zell's cheers were as loud as ever, and Ultimecia's face was once again a mask of disdain.

Squall lunged at Ultimecia, back arched and gunblade lifted high over his head. He gave it everything he had, forcing all of his skill into each blow he delivered. Blue blood sprayed from the top Ultimecia, Red from the upside down Ultimecia below. It all rained thickly onto Squall, making his leather jacket glisten in the starlight. After his last blow he stumbled, and felt Ultimecia's breath on his ear.

"Your loss." She breathed. Squall slashed her thin throat and turned away from the fresh splash of blue blood. In an instant her body was shrinking and expanding, distorting her features. He ran, using Rinoa's welcoming figure as his goal. His legs were burning, but he kept sprinting, her loving face beckoning him closer.

The darkness gathered around him, swirling in endless currents and spiraling to an abyss below him. He ran through the silky smoothness, blood that wasn't his dripping down his body as he found that he was still in total darkness, all alone.

Scared, he called for his friends. Only his empty echoes called back to him. He closed his eyes, taking a calming breath.

"Rinoa." He said, and he knew he could go on. He wasn't alone.

He opened his eyes and saw that the darkness had been replaced with a barren wasteland that stretched endlessly before his field of vision. The sky hung over him in heavy gray clouds that refused to rain. The air around him seemed to falter, stretching and pulling before falling back into place. Not knowing what else he could do, he began to walk on the cracked, rocky earth.

He must have walked for miles. The sunless sky dried the blood as he journeyed. All around him there was no signs of change, and he began to think the world was infinite. Where were his friends? Where was Rinoa?

Rinoa. If there was anyone worth going to for, it was Rinoa. His breathing became ragged, and he had to envision her sweet face to keep putting one foot in front of the other.

If he hadn't been so tired, his heart would have been racing at the sight of the ledge. It was a change. He slowly forced himself up the gradual slope, hoping his friends were down below.

He stood at the very edge and saw only gray clouds. He was at the edge of the Universe. Tired and dispirited, he collapsed.

_So, this is how it ends after all_. He thought. _In the end, I really am all alone. _He wondered how long it would take him to die. Not too long, only a few days, since he'd be going without food or water. He could handle that.

He sensed it before he saw it. A beautiful, solitary white feather fell from the ambivalent clouds. Hardly daring to hope, he slowly lifted his hand to grasp it. As it touched his glove the world around him morphed. The sky cleared into the colorful shades of sunset, and there were patches of grass beneath him.

And there she was, a vision of beauty, her slender figure facing away from him. He stood quickly as though he hadn't been walking for and endless amount of time. Cautiously, he called her name.

She didn't move.

"Rinoa." He repeated, his heart hammering in his chest. Rinoa would never taunt him like this. Something was wrong, but he couldn't move.

Painfully slowly, she turned to face him, and Squall's breath caught in his throat. A ripple crossed her face, and before it could settle back into place, it rippled again. No, this couldn't be happening…

He took a hesitant step forward and flinched back when memories blasted all around him, filling his senses completely.

Squall could never explain it. Each memory threw itself at him one after another, each one sickly twisted into a mockery of what it should have been.

The first thing he heard was the rushed music of the SeeD ball. Rinoa was standing a good distance away, just as she had the night he met her. She raised a finger, and though squall knew she should have been smiling, her face gently waved, making it impossible to see her properly. The sinister music repeated itself over and over again, Rinoa turning her head and pointing in sync with it each time. Her face seemed to loom closer, but her features never became any clearer.

"No!" Squall yelled, but his voice was lost in the memory.

He was floating somewhere outside of his body, aware of his horrified, silent screaming but also of the images that flashed before him.

Quistis. Selphie. Seifer. Zell. Irvine. Rinoa. She kept turning towards him, her silky hair blowing in the breeze. It all rushed at him faster and faster, coming closer until he could only see their eyes.

Her eyes weren't blurred, but they swept past him too quickly for him to take in. They flickered, flashing between Rinoa's soft gaze and Ultimecia's cold glare.

Sometime during the flickering he had landed in his body, and even though his throat was raw with soundless screaming, he couldn't stop. It was silent until Rinoa advanced towards him, her high heels clicking eerily along the ground. Again and again she stepped in his direction, but her face was always distorted and she never got any closer.

Then suddenly every moment he had ever spent with Rinoa was bearing down on him. It all passed too quickly for him to tell if her face was visible or not, until it all slowed down. She was in Space, and he was so far away, trying to catch her. He finally stopped screaming as he couldn't breathe. Rinoa's helmet had shattered, the shards drifting towards him as her necklace floated serenely about her.

A single tear rolled down his cheek and there were no more memories. No more endless earth and no more blackness. Only a pure and blinding light that he fell into. Rinoa was dead. He let himself be swallowed by the light.

He landed with a heavy thud, but he didn't even try to emerge from the back of his mind. Only one thing was echoing in his head. _She's gone._ Nothing mattered anymore. He would lay there and rot for an eternity, keeping his memories encased in his grief. He was about to accept his fate when he felt the wonderful sensation of someone stroking his hair with soft, gentle hands.

Oh, Squall…

That voice. It couldn't be. A flame stirred inside of him, and Squall fought to reach her. He weakly opened his eyes as Rinoa buried her head into his chest.

I'm so sorry, Squall. She cried into his jacket. I love you so much, please, please just tell me you love me, too.

"Of…course." He spoke around his throbbing throat. "I…love you." He pushed out the last two words with difficulty.

She gave a shuddering breath as she pulled him up tighter in her embrace. Squall finally felt at home, safe in her arms. He lifted his arms to caress her, but the minute he touched her, she began to dissolve.

I love you Squall.

He clutched at her desperately, but she continued to crumble into dust.

Goodbye, Squall.

She smiled at him before her face fell into a pile of ashes on top of the rest of her body. She slipped through his fingers and blew away into the wind. Squall screamed, and this time he could hear his own bloodcurdling cries.

"Squall!"

"Squall, snap out of it!"

"What's wrong with him!?"

"Move!"

Squall was once again left breathless, this time because of Seifer's fist in his gut. He laid there, eyes wide open. For a while he just listened to his cries echo off the Lunatic Pandora's walls, but then he realized he had to search for her.

His friends stood above him, all watching him with worried expressions. Ellone and the President were there, too, along with Seifer, but no Rinoa. Taking a few breaths, he sat up. Blood rolled down his hair, his face, the leather façade of his clothes, mingled with cold sweat. Hadn't it dried on him ages ago?

"Where's Rinoa?" He asked in a hoarse voice.

"What?" Zell asked.

"Where's Rinoa?" He repeated in a stronger voice.

"What are you talking about?" Seifer's brow furrowed.

"Who's Rinoa?" Selphie questioned.

"Don't play dumb!" He snarled, and he searched each and every one of their faces, but thy only looked scared.

"Give him some space, obviously Time Compression took its toll on him." Laguna ordered.

"No, she's real!" Squall took a step towards Quistis, but she backed into a defensive position. "She was here, you told me to save her!"

Quistis was shaking her head, her eyes wide and disbelieving. Squall dashed to her, wanting to shake her until she admitted that Rinoa had existed, that she was alive, but a sleep spell hit him from somewhere to his left. He lost consciousness before he hit the ground.

End Chapter

**A/N: Just something that occurred to me, and now felt like the right time to post it. Please review. **


	2. The Difference

Chapter Two: The Difference

Squall woke up, but he kept his eyes closed, trying to gauge his surroundings through his other senses. It was comfortably warm, and there was a bed beneath him, so he was no longer in the Lunatic Pandora. There was the low and steady hum of an engine, but it wasn't nearly as loud as the Ragnarok's, not to mention there was no bed in the Ragnarok. Not caring too much about that, he tried to focus on other noises, the ones he needed to be aware of.

Someone was pacing not too far from where he was. He heard the crisp pages of a magazine being carelessly turned, and heard the legs of a chair scrape against the floor. So there were at least three people in the room. If he could manage to cast a Triple on himself while feigning sleep, he could deal out Sleep spells to them, and manage to push through whoever else he might not have heard. From there maybe he could make it to an emergency door or an escape hatch and freefall, then land with the help of a Float spell. Then he could go back for Rinoa. Yes, it would work. But he had to cast Triple on himself wordlessly first.

_Triple_. He thought, trying to force the spell from his body. Nothing. _Triple._ He thought again, anxiously. Maybe he could get away with whispering it. He hoped no one was looking as he quietly cast the spell on himself.

"He's awake!" Zell yelled. So his plan was foiled already. Snapping his eyes open, Squall started to roll to his left, only to be halted by his right arm. Looking over he could see that his arm had been chained to the wall beside the bed. He had to get it off, he had to find Rinoa.

"Firaga!" He commanded, and the whole room (he could see now that the room was inhabited by the same crowd that had greeted him when he'd lost Rinoa) flinched away from his spell. However it was unnecessary, as Squall had cast it towards the chain coming from the wall. The spell bounced off of the metal and scorched his cheek.

"What are you, crazy!?" Seifer shouted as Squall swore. Squall felt someone tugging on his free arm and he immediately lashed out, but Quistis cast a Stop spell on him, and he found himself paralyzed. Irvine finished shackling Squall's left arm, and she released him from her spell.

"What is your problem?" Irvine asked, shaking his head.

"What would you do if you woke up a prisoner?" He spat in response.

"Don't try to pull that bullshit, you were making plans before you knew." Seifer snarled. Squall then realized that he must have been the center of attention. Of course, they must have lifted the Sleep spell from him in the first place. He'd been stupid not to notice that none of the room's occupants had spoken.

"Where's the Ragnarok?" He asked, eyes swiveling around an unfamiliar room. It appeared to be a sort of infirmary, but smaller to suit whatever ship they were traveling in.

"What?" Selphie asked, brows knit.

"Our ship." Squall answered impatiently. He didn't even know why he was bothering with small talk when every second Rinoa was further and further from reach.

"More nonsense." He heard Seifer mutter.

"I think I heard of it," Quistis said. "It was supposed to be lost in Space about twenty years ago."

"That was before me and Rinoa found it." Squall said through clenched teeth. Whatever game they were playing at, it was getting old. Seifer looked ready to make another harsh comment, but Quistis silenced him with a look.

"We don't know a Rinoa, ya know." Raijin told him from a wall. Squall looked around and sure enough, Fujin was by his side. But why were they there? Why was Seifer allowed there, for that matter? Taking a good look at his rival, he noted that his trench coat was fully intact, not tattered and dirty as he remembered it. He and his posse looked well fed and rested, not gaunt and shabby. But those questions could be answered later. Right now, Rinoa needed him, so he tried a different approach.

"Selphie," He said, hating the urgency in his voice. "Do you remember when I got promoted to Commander, you made Rinoa lure me out?" She gave him a puzzled look.

"Squall, you were never promoted to Commander." She said gently. She glanced around uncertainly, about to say something, but was discouraged by Irvine. He turned to Zell.

"You made me give you my ring," He started. "so you could make her a copy. Remember? Galbadia was invading but you still insisted-"

"No, Squall." Zell said, shaking his head. "Galbadia never attacked Balamb."

"What?" Squall asked. "No, don't you remember…" His gray eyes locked on Irvine. "She made you turn around and rescue us from the D-District prison-"

"Would you stop it!?" Seifer snapped angrily. "Snap out of it already!"

"Seifer, calm down." Ellone finally spoke up gently but firmly. She was sitting at the chair by his bed, gazing into his face with warm concern. "Squall, why don't you tell us when, exactly, you met Rinoa."

"Why, you don't believe me." Squall retorted.

"You can tell me when, and I'll show you what really happened." She said. For a moment, Squall hesitated. What if she was right, and he'd have to see a world without Rinoa? But he had to prove to them that she had existed, so he nodded.

"I met her at the SeeD ball." He said.

"And who did you see the most that night?" Ellone asked.

"Quistis." He answered, knowing that she meant anyone who wasn't Rinoa.

"Quisty, do you mind?" Ellone asked, and Quistis shook her head. Ellone closed her eyes, and about a minute later a ringing filled his head, and he felt his body go limp.

***

_Quistis was walking around that night, glancing at the SeeDs who'd passed. Though she'd never boast about it, she was proud that almost her whole group had passed. _Her_ group. And it was expected that Seifer would fail, anyways, so she considered herself a success._

_She sighed, glancing up to watch a shooting star fall across the sky. If almost her whole group had passed where so many others had failed, why had her Instructor's License been revoked? She honestly couldn't see where she'd gone wrong. She began to search the room again, and this time her blue eyes rested on her favorite pupil._

_**I should be dancing with Rinoa right now…** Squall thought frantically. Instead of dancing, Squall was still leaning against a wall, sipping a martini. He looked rather bored with the whole thing, as if it were a heavy burden placed upon him._

I wonder if he'd even care that I was demoted._ Quistis' thoughts rang through him. Seeing the silent Mercenary stare moodily into the distance was Quistis' deciding factor. Of course he wouldn't care, he was Squall Leonhart, the Lone Wolf. Even where most of his peers were celebrating and having a good time, he stood alone, not a part of it all. She still had lingering thoughts of approaching him, but the young man placed his empty glass on a passing girl's tray and slipped back to his room._

_***_

Squall woke up again, staring at Quistis and Ellone.

"I was supposed to dance with her and-"

"What happened after you met her?" Ellone cut him off. She seemed determined to prove that Rinoa's entire existence was nothing.A little too determined, in Squall's opinion.

Squall thought back to what he remembered to be true. When he recalled he turned his gaze back to Ellone.

"We were assigned to go to Timber and help her resistance group." He found that he couldn't say her name anymore; it hurt too much.

"Who's we?" Ellone asked.

"Me, Zell, and Selphie were sent first." He swallowed, glancing at Seifer. "Then Seifer got mad that Cid only sent us three and came rushing in after us." His rival looked indignantly confused. "Quistis was forced to try to stop him, and so she came as well."

"Go on." Ellone encouraged, her face grim.

"Seifer attacked the President and crossed over to Edea's side. Rin…_she_ ended up joining our group." His eyes flickered to Fujin and Raijin. "When they learned that Seifer had double-crossed us, they joined him."

By that point, Fujin, Raijin and Seifer looked ready to protest, while the rest remained uncomfortably hesitant. A bad feeling was settling around Squall.

"So now you're going to tell me what really happened, right?" He asked.

"No," Ellone said softly. "I think you should tell us everything up to now."

It all felt awkward. Ellone hadn't talked to him so much in years, and now all of a sudden she was in charge. For some reason she had an aura of entitlement, as if she were the Commander of the ship. Stranger still, none of his friends -who were closer to him- were taking such an aggressive roll. He took a breath before trying to answer.

"We met Irvine at Galbadia Garden. We were supposed to assassinate Edea." As soon as the words passed his lips he could practically hear the room sharply inhale. They were all exchanging glances.

"And how did that go?" Ellone asked him, the only one not looking sad at his words.

"We failed, and we were sent to the D-District Prison." Squall continued. "Irvine managed to worm out of it somehow, and _she_ was able to get out of it because she was Caraway's daughter."

"Caraway? General Caraway?" Quistis asked. Squall nodded before resuming:

"We managed to escape, but we found out that missiles were headed towards Trabia and Balamb." By their expressions, Squall knew he needed to expand. "Selphie, Quistis and _she_ went to the missile base to try to stop them, while me, Irvine and Zell headed to Balamb to warn them."

"This is starting to sound pretty cool." Zell whispered, but only got dirty looks from the rest of the room. He ducked his head down. "Continue." He muttered.

"We managed to figure out how to make Balamb airborne, but Trabia wasn't so fortunate." Here, Quistis interrupted.

"But Balamb hasn't been mobile in ages, Cid's not even sure that it ever was." She argued.

"Look, I'm just telling you what I remember, am I allowed to do that?" Squall asked, irritated. It was starting to get uncomfortable with his arms stretched to either side of him. She nodded, and he went on. During that time Squall decided not to go into detail of Zell asking for the ring and Squall saving _her. _They wouldn't believe him, anyways, and so it wouldn't matter.

"But for a while, we thought the girls were dead. They were in the missile base when it self destructed." Squall explained. "But we were able to meet up with them in Fisherman's Horizon.

"Shortly after that, we went to Galbadia. When we beat Edea, she passed on her powers to…you know, _her. She _was in a coma, and so we tried to find Dr. Odine, since we heard he was the only one who could help.

"We crossed the Great Salt Lake and made it to Esthar. We had to go to space to find you, and…and she became possessed by Ultimecia. She was lost in Space for a while, but I had to go out and save her." He could feel his face becoming hot and his heart becoming cold with the memory of Rinoa in his arms. "We thought we'd drift in Space forever, but then we came across the Ragnarok. We were able to survive and land the ship.

"After that, we had to get to the Lunatic Pandora. Seifer had captured her and Adel used her as bait to keep us from using our on her. We defeated her, used Ellone's powers to get us to Ultimecia's realm, and defeated Ultimecia." _I wished we hadn't._ He thought bitterly.

"Is that all?" Ellone asked, her dark eyes questioning. Squall thought back to those last painful moments where Rinoa was erased from his life before falling into dust. He nodded.

"Yes, sis." The whole room became uncomfortable again, and the less discreet members of the group were even staring wide eyed and disbelieving at him. Was his pain that obvious?

"Do you guys want to tell him what really happened after you passed the SeeD exam?" Ellone asked quietly, staring into her lap. Zell, Selphie and Seifer looked to Quistis.

"Well…the next day Cid spoke to Squall privately. He'd noticed that Squall was unhappy, that he hadn't smiled once since Ellone had left the orphanage." Quistis looked uncomfortable, shifting on her feet. "So, well, we found this out later, but he offered Squall a position on the Elite White SeeD ship."

"What?" It was Squall's turn to be confused.

"You accepted." Quistis said simply with a shrug. "Of course, you didn't know Ellone was onboard, you just did it because it was a higher position in ranks." Her blue eyes said: _That's what you told me when I asked, anyways._

"But, Seifer…?" Squall looked to the tall blonde.

"I never went to a 'bad side.'" He answered. "Things started looking fishy in Deling, and even though I didn't formally pass an exam the Headmaster knew that this team needed my strength. Since I was there, Fujin and Raijin were able to tag along."

"We did meet Caraway," Irvine spoke up. His face was shadowed by his hat, and for some reason Selphie grabbed his hand. Since when had they become so open? "and he told us his great plan to assassinate the Sorceress." He swallowed hard before going on. "And it was a success." The room fell quiet with the remembrance of loss.

"What?" Squall finally found his voice.

"We took her down." Selphie said, but from the way she gripped Irvine, he knew that meant that Irvine had shot Edea.

"After Edea was killed, Cid couldn't stand to run Balamb." Quistis explained. "He knew it still needed to hold up, but he couldn't stay there. He appointed me Headmaster and Seifer Commander of Balamb Garden."

"No offense to you, but we only just started to really get to know you." Selphie said, looking at Squall. "We've been busy with our side of the battle, and you were busy protecting Ellone. We only really started working with you when we went up to battle Adel."

So the people in this room weren't even his friends. Well, if they were, they weren't nearly as close to him as he considered them when he woke up. Something occurred to him, and though he knew the idea would be shot down, he needed to bring it up.

"But…but Space." Squall sputtered. "The Ragnarok…"

"This is an Esthar ship." Zell answered. "Your dad's in the other room."

"My _what_!?" Squall nearly yelled, and everyone in the room winced.

"Your…dad?" Zell tried again weakly. Everyone else could tell that he'd treaded on dangerous territory.

"Look, it's getting to be too much for him." Ellone said, noticing something in Squall's expression. "We'll finish this when he can handle it."

"Fine, just go." Squall hissed, and the room hastened to empty. Ellone was the last to stand, and when everyone else left, she hesitated in the doorframe, giving him a pitiful look.

"How important was she to you?" She asked. He felt his muscles loosen in numbness.

"Everything." His gray eyes met her dark ones. "She was everything to me." She bit her lip, nodded, and left the room without another word. He was left to his own thoughts.

He should have just listened to Ultimecia. He should have turned his back on Zell, he should have never denied Rinoa. Flashes of her tear-streaked face kept running across his mind, and he shuddered.

No. He refused to believe that Rinoa couldn't exist. Ultimecia must have cast a spell on the rest of them. Some logical part of him told him it would be much more work that casting a spell on him, but he pushed it aside. This was easier to believe. He would put up with their delusions, just long enough for him to go to Deling and find Caraway.

_But what if Rinoa didn't really exist?_ a small voice asked from the back of his mind. It only took a few minutes to come up with a solution to that, but, staring at the blank ceiling, Squall decided not to think of that alternative just yet. For now, he just had to behave until they let him go.

End Chapter

**A/N: A little strange, a little dull, but overall it was okay, I think. I already know it can't be 100% accurate (for Squall's recap), but bear with me. Sorry for taking so long to update, but my track season is over, and I graduate next month, so hopefully I can update a little more frequently. If you really enjoyed this, you can occupy my other story, _The Quistis Effect_ which is much closer to being done. All my other FFVIII fics are finished. Thank you for reading, and please review.**


	3. Deling

Chapter Three: Deling

Squall stepped off of the Esthar ship right before Zell and after Seifer. The blondes watched his every move, Zell in particular, and he knew he'd have to work hard to get them to let him go. He rolled his shoulders in an obvious way, making it clear that the chains had hurt him. Selphie looked at him pitifully, but Seifer only rolled his eyes.

_I'll just pretend I care about this life._ He thought. _Then I'll catch the first train to Deling. _

Laguna was at the head of the line, and he stepped off of the long staircase and onto the metallic platform first. Someone had told him about Squall's "delusions," and he'd kept his distance since then. Good, Squall didn't need to be dealing with him right now.

"I guess this is it." Seifer said, merry eyes meeting up with everyone's but Squall's. "We're finally done. What?" He added in an irritated tone when he looked at Quistis.

"Honestly, Seifer, I didn't know you were so selfish." It surprised Squall that she actually sounded upset. Quistis wasn't known for being so open, and since when was Seifer even worth it to her? But then he remembered that he knew nothing about them, and dismissed it.

"It's not my problem, he'll get over it. And I don't think it's any of our business anyways." Seifer's eyes flickered to Squall in irritation, as though it was his fault Quistis was mad at him.

Quistis had opened her mouth to protest, but Ellone shook her head. "Don't worry about it, Quistis. It'll get resolved. You're going to be busy enough."

"If you say so." Quistis relented, but her wary eyes glanced at Squall. His face remained passive. "Come on, SeeDs." Quistis led the Balamb crew (which he was not a part of) off of the platform, undoubtedly towards some other ship that would take them home. They all glanced at him at some point or another-Seifer undoubtedly looking for another excuse to punch him-but he kept his dead expression until they were gone. It felt so wrong watching them leave, he should have been leading them. And she should have been by his side.

"So…" Laguna looked uncomfortably between Squall and Ellone.

"It's okay. I'll handle this." Ellone answered. They were really making it too easy for Squall. "We'll meet you later." Laguna nodded gratefully before heading up a flight of stairs.

Squall had only just started forming an escape plan when Ellone turned to face him. "Well, come on, we have to be getting to Deling, was it?" This threw Squall off.

"What?"

"Come on, Squall, I know you're too stubborn to give up so easily." She told him, already beginning to walk. He fell into step beside her. "So, I'll make you a deal."

"I'm listening."

"I'll take you anywhere you need to go, we'll search the whole world for Rinoa if you insist." Squall felt an agonizing stabbing in his chest at the mention of her name.

"Don't say her name." He ordered angrily. She looked up at him, her brown eyes searching, and nodded.

"Sorry. We'll look as long as you like, but in return, you have to let me let you remember, okay?"

Squall thought it over. He would find a lead, somehow, and if he didn't agree he'd never be able to look. He could already see himself arriving in Deling only to have Seifer waiting for him. He just had to pretend he cared, that wasn't so bad.

"All right." Squall finally answered. He noticed that they were walking towards the community portion of the city. "I thought we were leaving?"

"Something tells me we'll be gone for a while." Ellone said. "We'll need some supplies, and we'll have to get the car."

"We're going to drive all the way to Deling?"

"No. You really did forget everything, didn't you?" She asked almost playfully. "Hovercraft."

They walked up to a mechanical wall with two soldiers standing guard. They took one look at Ellone and Squall before simultaneously turning and punching in codes on the wall. The wall slid open, and Ellone pushed the small of Squall's back, urging him forward.

Squall was secretly pleased when he felt no familiarity as his eyes took in the large mansion. It was huge, white and blue like the rest of the city, sleek, tall and impenetrable. It seemed too cold and impersonal to be a home. Too much of Squall's tastes to possibly belong to Laguna. There weren't even any hedges lining the long, winding driveway.

"Familiar?" Ellone asked. Squall gave her a sideways glance.

"A little." Best to give her hope now.

"That's good." She nodded, looking entirely unconvinced. They got to the front door, and she pulled out a card key, sliding it into the slot beneath the doorbell. There was a click and beep before the door opened. Ellone led the way inside.

"You should pack some clothes." She told him, stepping into a large foyer. She motioned for him to follow her up the grand staircase. There was a portrait of Raine about halfway up, and Squall made it a point not to look at it. "We could be in Deling for a while."

"Since the General might be busy, right?" Squall guessed. Ellone nodded. She stopped at the top of the stairs. "You're room is the last one on the right. I'll meet you downstairs in fifteen minutes, okay?" He nodded and she turned to her left.

He turned the doorknob of his room, almost afraid of what might be in there. However, it wouldn't budge. Of course, he'd locked it. He dug around his pockets for a key, wondering if it was lost in Time Compression. He turned out his jacket's pockets, slid his hands into all of his pants pockets, and was beginning to think he didn't have a key when he brushed a keychain dangling from one of his belt loops. He unclasped it and inspected it. It held only two keys with a small black charm shaped like a paper fan. He jammed the correct key into the lock and turned it, finally entering his room.

It was large, more space than he was accustomed to, and it was mostly bare. The queen-sized bed was covered in crisp white sheets and comforters and layers of deep red pillows and blankets. It looked particularly welcoming at that moment. He disregarded it and headed to a polished black dresser, sifting through the drawers and throwing in various items of clothing. He glanced at the closet and saw a white SeeD uniform hanging proudly. He sneered at it before closing the closet, not wanting to look at it. But the thing that perplexed him most about his room was the large poster of a well known band plastered on the wall opposite of his bed. He barely listened to music, so developing an admiration for a band seemed just plain weird. How could he seem so foreign to himself? He dug a backpack out from under his bed, stuffed his clothes in it, and headed for the bathroom to dump the rest of his necessities in. He made sure his door was locked before heading down the stairs.

He glanced at his watch when he reached the bottom, only to realize he hadn't checked the time when he'd left Ellone. He guessed that he'd taken about ten minutes, and something told him Ellone would take longer than fifteen. He walked towards the other door by the Foyer, curious about the house.

The room was a living room, filled with white couches and squishy armchairs. There was a large portrait of Laguna hanging on one of the walls, and Squall rolled his eyes. He tried to imagine himself sitting in the room with Ellone or Laguna pestering him not to polish his gunblade on the sofa, but he couldn't. Squall had no family. The only person who ever loved him was gone. He was about to sit in one of the sofas when Ellone appeared in the doorway.

"Geeze, Squall." She said with a small smile. "I thought you left without me." He shook his head, not returning the smile. _I wouldn't know how._

"Well, come on, we have a journey to start." Ellone said, swinging her own backpack over her shoulder before exiting.

She led him to a large garage, past a red car, black hovercraft and to a lime green hovercraft waiting at the end. It was a little smaller than the car, smaller than the black hovercraft. Ellone took out her own set of keys and the lights flashed before the doors swung open. Squall stepped into the passenger side, and despite himself, watched with interest as Ellone started it up.

"Buckle up." She said before the craft began to rise. He did so, his gray eyes locked skywards as the ceiling of the garage slowly opened. They ascended, and once they were clear of the building, Ellone began to fly, and it wasn't at a slow pace, either. They were out of sight before the garage ceiling even began to close.

"Do you have a plan?" Squall asked her, since she seemed so sure of herself. She nodded.

"I made reservations at the Deling Hotel." She told him. We're going to rest for the night, then try our luck tomorrow." She caught the irritated look on his face and added: "Besides, it's rude to call at this time."

Squall watched the ocean zoom beneath him, trying to think of what to ask the general. _Did you ever meet a Julia Heartilly? Do you have a daughter named Rinoa? Where is she, what is she doing? Is she okay?_

All of those questions seemed stupid, things he could ask citizens of Deling, but they were the only ones he could think of. He sighed, watching his breath stain the glass.

"So, do you know what you're going to ask General Caraway?" Ellone asked, not taking her gaze off of the open sky in front of her.

"Kind of." He answered. He remembered what she'd said about letting her let him remember. "When did you want to put me through my own past?"

"Before we go to bed, if that's okay with you." She answered.

"That's fine." He went back to gazing out of his window. Slowly, he noticed that the clouds became thicker. The pollution of Deling. He looked down and sure enough, right below was the bustling city.

Ellone circled her hovercraft into tight circles before landing it gracefully between two cars outside of the Deling Hotel. They both exited at the same time, but Ellone was closer to the pavement, and she entered the grand hotel first.

"You locked it, right?" Squall asked, glancing back at the hovercraft. It was so conspicuous. The last thing he needed was to be stranded in Deling.

"Naturally." Ellone said with a wave of her hand. "Hold on, I'll get our keys." She walked up to the front desk while Squall hovered in the lobby. The chairs looked too inviting, and he was surprised at how tired he was. Then he remembered that it was just earlier that day that he'd fought two sorceresses and many monsters in between. Well, _maybe_ he had.

"Come on, Squall." Squall turned to see Ellone standing behind him. He nodded, and they walked up the stairs. She gave him a card key, and he was surprised she trusted him with one. They were silent until they reached their room. When they entered, they both began to talk at the same time.

"So you were going to-" Squall had begun.

"I think you should-" They both stopped, realizing they had interrupted each other.

"Go on." Ellone motioned for him to continue. Squall closed the door, dropping his bag onto a bed before speaking.

"So, you were going to take me back?" He asked.

"Yeah, but I think you should jump in the shower, first." Ellone said. "We'll probably be ready for a nap by the time we're done in the past.

"Okay." He said, grabbing his bag and heading to the bathroom. He was no longer covered in dried blood (he realized that someone must have cleaned him up while he slept), but he still felt grungy, and the shower was good. However, about halfway through his shower he felt that something was off. He glanced at the door. Was Ellone doing something? Not turning off the shower, Squall quietly slipped out, pulling a towel around his waist and silently cursing the soap suds that slipped down his hair and onto the floor. He grabbed a glass from the porcelain sink and held it to the door, pressing his ear to it.

"…so I'm sorry if he says anything strange." He heard Ellone apologize. She paused. "Yes. I'm so glad you're willing to help." Another pause. "No, that won't be necessary. We can meet you in two days. I'm sure, I don't want to bother you so late." She paused again. "Don't worry, two days is fast enough, I'm sure. Thanks again, and good bye."

Squall stepped back into the shower angrily. They could have been in and out of Deling in just a few hours, but Ellone was dragging it out to days. He wouldn't be able to hear a thing about Rinoa for two whole days! That was two days of agonizing waiting, but not like Ellone cared. So long as she could distract Squall from what was important, nothing mattered to her.

He was sure to mop up his bubbly mess before walking out in his black pajama pants. Her eyes lingered on him, and for a minute he thought that she knew that he knew, but then she spoke up.

"Okay, I'm just going to shower quickly, then we can start." She stood with her things and went into the bathroom before he could say anything. He dropped his bag next to his bed and stretched out on it. If he had two whole days to do whatever Ellone wanted to do, he wasn't going to start now. He closed his eyes, making his face slack. A few minutes later, he heard Ellone come out of the bathroom. He heard her sigh, but his eyelids became considerably darker as the lights went out.

End Chapter

**A/N: I actually feel like this was a decent chapter. I really got into it. I hope the rest of you agree and choose to review. Oh, I started a new story, _Gotta Get the Girl_, a humor fic (or at least trying to be), so if you can, you should read. Thank you all for your time!**


	4. The First Memory

**A/N: ^^^ indicates flashback from now on.**

Chapter Four: The First Memory

_Squall walked along a lonely beach shore, right where the waves met the soft yellow sand. Every footstep left a sloppy imprint behind him, but when his feet reemerged from the moist earth, they were clean, not a speck of sand on their glossy soles. Mist rolled in from all directions; he couldn't see the land to his left or the ocean to his right. Only the place where the two met._

_He shielded his eyes when there was a white, blinding light from the land side. He cringed into it, but it was too bright, like trying to stare into the sun. There was another light to his right, but this one was dimmer, shimmering softly like the glow of the moon. Squall gazed into it, and he was able to see that the splendid light was radiating from Rinoa. For a moment he was overjoyed, but then he saw that she was being dragged off to sea._

_"Squall! Help me!" She screamed. A wave crashed over her delicate form. Not wasting a second, Squall ran into the cold water._

_He ran, pushing through the surging current, but the distance between Rinoa and himself remained the same._

_"Help! Squall, help!" He saw her pale face once more before she was pulled down by the undertow. He tried to scream for her, tried to call her name, but no noise escaped his mouth. Rinoa…Rinoa…she was fading from his sight, from his mind…_

"Calm." Ellone whispered, her hand held above Squall's forehead. A light radiated from her palm and vanished into Squall's skin. The mercenary stopped stirring in his sleep, laying still. Ellone sighed, smoothing out Squall's bangs. She could just barely hear the city's busy streets through the hotel's walls.

Ellone had acquired many 'homemade magics' as Laguna called them. Years of traveling with no real hobby led to reckless experimentation. She'd hurt herself more times than she could count, but she always thought it was worth it. Like having Calm to settle someone, for instance.

"Squall…" She shook her head sadly before returning to her own bed.

***

Squall woke up to his internal alarm. Fragments of a bad dream tried to resurface in his mind, but all he could remember was that Rinoa had been involved. He exhaled heavily, pressing his hand to his scarred forehead. He wanted to remember his dream, just to see her again. He glanced over at Ellone's bed, and saw her still sleeping. He could run from the room, barge into Caraway's Mansion, and demand to know about Rinoa…no, that was just stupid. Why couldn't he think of a sensible plan?

"Good m-morning, Squall." Ellone yawned. She was still laying on her bed, but she had rolled to her side to face him. Squall nodded in response. He hadn't forgiven her for postponing his meeting with Caraway. She slowly sat up and stretched before sliding off of her bed.

"Do you think you're ready for a memory?" She asked him.

"You don't want to eat breakfast first or something?" Squall replied.

"Oh, right. Sorry, I'm used to doing this sort of thing first thing in the morning. The magic's fresher." She explained.

"Then I guess we should get it over with." Squall muttered, not bothering to move from his bed.

"No, you're right, we should eat something. Why don't we go down and…" Something must have hit her when Squall looked up at her. "I know, let's meet here in an hour, okay?"

"Whatever." He responded, grabbing a change of clothes before heading to the bathroom.

_How am I supposed to brace myself for this?_ Squall thought as he descended the stairs to the hotel restaurant. He scanned the area quickly, and, finding that Ellone was not present, grabbed a few slices of toast before taking a seat. He knew he was going to see things he didn't want to see. He knew Ellone was going to try to get him to believe Rinoa didn't exist. He didn't know how to hold on to Rinoa without going crazy.

_Maybe there'll be something wrong._ He hoped, absent-mindedly shoving a bite of toast into his mouth. _Maybe her magic will take me to what really happened…_After a couple of more bites of toast, he found that he wasn't hungry, and left his table without any further dawdling.

As he walked into the lobby, Squall checked the wall clock. He still had plenty of time. Not really thinking, he walked out into Deling's streets. He didn't care where he wandered to, it wasn't as though he had anything to do with himself. He watched the traffic pass him by as he dragged his feet on the sidewalk. Cars, motorcycles, shuttles, they all came and went in an insignificant blur.

He just looked up to stare at the passengers of a shuttle bus, and that's when he saw her eyes. A jolt of remembrance shocked through his soul as those dark eyes went speeding away in the window of a shuttle. Rinoa was on that shuttle. Squall ran after it, determined to beat it to its next stop. His shoulders bumped against many grumpy passerby, but he didn't care. He had to get to the next stop, he had to get to Rinoa.

He abruptly halted when he came to the shuttle sign, knowing he had to have beat the slow vehicle. Squall adjusted himself until he could see through the thick crowd, and to his relief saw the shuttle rumbling its way down the road. He straightened up and was prepared to board the shuttle, but it passed right by.

"Hey!" Squall yelled indignantly. Why hadn't it stopped? He wanted to hit something…There was a light chuckle behind him, and he turned to see a girl, probably about sixteen, laughing.

"You look so surprised." She said, popping a gum bubble loudly.

"Well, I thought it would stop at the shuttle sign." He answered sarcastically. She snickered, tossing her long brown hair behind her.

"Why would it?" She popped another bubble, and this one clung to her sunglasses. She wadded up the gum, scraping it off of the dark surface before throwing it in the street.

"You know what, I don't have time for this." Squall muttered, walking away from her.

"Good, just get back to your hotel." Squall turned around, but the girl was nowhere to be seen. He swore under his breath as he headed back to the hotel. _Great, just great. The last thing I need is to be seeing things. _He would not admit that seeing those eyes on the shuttle might have counted as "seeing things."

***

"Hello, Squall." Ellone said when he moodily opened the door. She was either oblivious or unaffected by his sour expression. "Are you ready?" He nodded, and she laid on her bed.

"You should probably get comfortable." She said, and he walked over to his bed. He took a few breaths, staring at the bland white ceiling. One breath, two breaths, three breaths…

A ringing noise filled Squall's head, and the ceiling began fading into a dim grey. He lost awareness of his body as he was flung into the past.

He was in his own body, but in unfamiliar clothing. His past self glanced into the full length mirror in his old cadet dorm, and he saw that he was dressed in the White SeeD uniform. He and his past form stared.

_I'm really gonna do this._ He heard his past thoughts. _I'm really going to the White Seed Ship. No more Quistis….and no more Seifer._ The past Squall sighed before picking up his small suitcase and gunblade case and leaving the room.

It was night. Squall searched his old body's memories and saw that Cid had instructed him to leave after curfew. The White SeeDs weren't meant to be widely known, and the fewer amount of people that saw him, the better. He glanced at every color coded sign he passed, knowing he'd most likely never see them again. It was only when he passed the Quad that he heard footsteps behind him. He turned, and saw Quistis standing in the dark.

"So, you're really leaving, huh?" She asked, arms casually folded across her chest.

"Yeah." Squall answered without any feeling. She was no longer in charge of him, he wasn't stuck listening to her. But, he knew she must have followed him for more than just that, so he asked: "Is that all you wanted to know."

"But Squall, this is your home." Quistis said. "How can you just turn your back on it so easily?" Squall grunted.

"Home? Instructor Trepe, we're mercenaries. We'll never have a place to call home."

"I'm sorry you feel that way." Was all she said before saluting. "Good luck, Squall." He nodded to her, unable to salute with his hands full. She watched him leave in the darkness.

He made it to the front gate without any further interruption. He walked through the winding trail to Balamb town, taking in every tree as he left. _Maybe I should have been nicer to Quistis. I probably should have at least said good bye. _Well that wasn't right, Squall hadn't learned compassion until he met Rinoa. He wanted to walk out of the memory, and Ellone sensed it.

_**Just relax, Squall. Give it a chance.**_

Squall walked through the sleeping Balamb town, not even sparing a reminiscent glance at Ma Dincht's house. He really hadn't gotten to know Zell, then. He didn't stop walking until he reached the pier, where the grand White SeeD ship was bobbing. A lone figure dressed identically to him stood at the entrance.

"Squall Leonhart." A young man with short brown hair and a small mole under his eye regarded him. Squall nodded, and he went on. "My name is Creed, I'm captain of the ship.

"At your service." Squall answered automatically, ignoring the sore in his arms from lugging around his encased gunblade. He wished Creed would get to the point.

"I was told you have extraordinary skill when it comes to the gunblade." He said, his brown eyes flickering to Squall's gunblade case. Squall didn't answer. "I trust Headmaster Cid's judgment. He says you're the most capable of your school." He paused, looking slightly bitter. "And that you'd be the strongest on this ship."

"So what position did Headmaster Cid have in mind?" Squall asked.

"Follow me." Creed said, walking down into the ship. Squall followed him down the narrow hallway, deeper down until they reemerged on the deck. Creed grabbed the steering wheel and guided the ship away from the harbor.

"The purpose of this ship is to protect a good, powerful sorceress from the Edea's grasp." Creed explained. Squall set his things next to himself. "We're constantly traveling, making sure we don't linger in one area for too long. We have a good group, but our numbers are few, since we can't have too many. We're strong but we…lack the intensive training of a Garden." It seemed hard for him to admit. "Headmaster Cid thinks you'd be a good personal body guard for Sorceress Ellone."

"Ellone?" Squall asked. Something about the name was familiar.

"Yes." Creed answered, pressing a button before turning to Squall. "You'd have to spend all of your time with her, making sure she was safe at all costs. Are you sure you can handle that responsibility?"

"Basically my life has to mean less than hers. Understood." Creed shook his head, and Squall was confused.

"You have to be strong enough to survive and make sure she makes it to safety. Your wasted life means nothing if she's captured." Creed said. Squall nodded.

"I understand."

"Good. Your room's the last to the left, she's probably waiting for you." Creed dismissed him. Squall did the salute he should have given Quistis before picking up his things and walking down a corridor.

He opened the door to find Ellone seated at a small table, looking up from a book. She smiled when she saw him.

"Hi, Squall." She greeted, standing up. "Do you remember me?"

Squall thought for a minute, his eyebrows knitting. Ellone's smile didn't falter.

"It's okay, it was a long time ago. You'll remember later." She reassured him. "You can have the bunk on the left, okay?"

"That's fine." He said, sitting on his new bed. Firm.

Squall felt himself being pulled from the memory until he was floating in the dim grayness again.

_**Don't worry, Squall, I'm just fast forwarding a little. We pretty much just go to sleep.**_ Ellone's voice rang in his mind. Before he could respond he was thrown back into his White SeeD self. They were in the room, but from the light flooding in through the window, it appeared to be afternoon. Ellone was sitting at her table again, and Squall was going through his junctions.

He was scrolling through his magic when he suddenly remembered Ellone. His heart skipped a beat and he looked at Ellone in a whole new way. Feeling ridiculously nervous, he spoke up.

"Ellone?" He asked, forcing his voice to remain steady.

"Yes, Squall?" She turned to look at him, her eyes betraying expectancy.

"Were we…we were at an orphanage, weren't we?"

"You remembered!" She exclaimed joyfully. "I can finally ask how you've been doing all this time. Squall, how have you been?" She asked quickly.

"I've been fine."

"Oh, more than that, Squall."

"I've become a gunblade specialist since the last time you've seen me."

"All right, I know how this is going to be." Ellone said, closing her book and standing up. "Why don't we make a deal?" He didn't acknowledge her, but she continued. "We spar."

"Spar?" Squall asked. Ellone couldn't fight, if she could, he wouldn't be needed.

"If I win, you give me an actual conversation." She said. "If you win, I'll leave you alone."

"No, thanks." Squall muttered.

"I know you're getting restless, Squall." Ellone said, rolling her eyes. "You're not used to being confined and immobile, huh? Come on, just a little spar, what do you have to lose?"

_Better just do what she says._ He thought a little miserably. "Fine." He got up and grabbed his gunblade. He followed her onto the deck.

A couple of White SeeDs were sparring with short swords, and Squall leaned against a railing, waiting for their turn.

_I'll have to find a way to go easy on her without doing too much damage._ _I could always just do one powerful hit to get it over with._

One of the boys knocked down the other, and Ellone took her place in the middle of the deck as they walked off.

"Wow, Ellone, picking on your bodyguard already?" One of the SeeDs asked.

"Well, I have to make sure he's strong enough to protect me." Ellone shrugged. Creed looked up from a map he was reading with caution, and Squall noticed a small crowd forming. It didn't matter, it wasn't going to last long. He walked until he was a good distance away from Ellone.

_I'll have to stay clear of the edges, I can't afford to damage the ship._ He looked for any other hazards, and after finding none, got into his fighting stance.

Ellone pulled out what appeared to be a lime green paper fan from her shawl before tossing it to the side. She got into a defensive stance, eyes determined.

_She's going to fight me with a fan?_ He thought incredulously.

"Are you ready, Squall?" Ellone asked. Squall nodded.

"Go!" One of the SeeDs yelled, slicing the air with his hand.

"Firaga!" Squall yelled. Ellone ducked and rolled out of the way, and the flames burnt out in midair. Ellone made a slashing motion with her fan, and small knives shot through the air towards Squall. He held up his gunblade, and they fell uselessly against it.

"Not bad." Ellone commented. "But can you handle-THIS!" The crowd cheered as a small tornado flew from Ellone's fan, small metal weapons clanking against each other in the current. Squall ran from it, but it followed closely.

_What kind of attack is that?_ He thought. He felt a small blade dig into his back, but he kept running. When he was comfortably far from the weapon tornado, he stopped.

"Stop!" He cast, and the wind halted. The weapons fell onto the floor, and he quickly flung the weapon from out of his back. Knowing he couldn't give Ellone any more distance, he charged at her, raising his gunblade as he ran. The crowd went wild.

"Chaos!" Ellone yelled, and as she extended a hand Squall felt a wave of heat blistering the air around him. Everything was disorienting, the crowd's faces were blurring, Ellone was smearing. He felt something knock him off of his feet, and when he hit the floor the world didn't stop spinning. He didn't know where his gunblade landed. Something cool was pressed against his neck, but Squall wasn't about to give up. Forcing himself to move, he grabbed what must have been Ellone's arm and flipped her over. Sure enough, she shrieked in shock when she landed next to him. The spell was lifted, but the world still wasn't quite right to Squall.

Squall grabbed one of the tiny weapons from Ellone's tornado spell and struck her over the head with its hilt. As he brought it down, the blade sliced down her jaw and towards her neck.

"Curaga!" Creed yelled, and immediately Ellone's new wound healed. He turned to Squall, upset. "You're supposed to be her body guard and you try to _kill_ her?!"

"Relax, Creed." Ellone said in a hoarse voice. She cleared her throat. "It wasn't even that bad…Cure." Squall felt the wound in his back close, and he sat up. "I knew what I was getting into. Come on, Squall."

When Squall opened his eyes, he was laying in a Deling hotel bed. He rolled over to look at Ellone.

"I still have the scar, see?" She lifted her face so her neck was exposed.

"How come I don't remember any of this?" He asked, the possibility that those events might have happened finally seeming possible.

"Time Compression, but I'm sure it'll wear off." Ellone said. "Sorry, Squall, that was all I could handle, right now. We'll do some more later, okay?" He nodded, and Ellone curled up for a nap. Squall had never thought about how much energy it must have taken to project memories, and he watched her restless slumber. He took a deep breath before walking to the window and staring out at the street. He thought he saw a girl with long brown hair and sunglasses, but Squall couldn't trust what he saw anymore.

End Chapter

**A/N: Well, that was pretty long by my standards. Tell me what you think of it, please.**


	5. Xaiden

-1Chapter Five: Xaiden

"Are you ready?" Squall looked up from his bed to see Ellone leaning against the bathroom doorframe. He'd been sitting on his bed, thinking of all the SeeD ship memories she'd shown him during the past couple of days.

It had taken a few weeks, but Ellone's patient prodding had finally made an impact on Squall. He was still insecure, but they could talk, to an extent.

"So, I take it you didn't have a cute little girlfriend you had to leave behind to come here?" Ellone asked, laying on her bed, hands propping up her head and legs crossed in the air. Though he was flustered by the question, Squall kept a poker face.

"No." He answered simply.

"Squall, don't be like that." Ellone sighed, cocking her head to a side. "If you're going to talk, really _talk_."

"What more do you want to hear from me?" He asked, irritated. Was he supposed to elaborate on everything he said? To his surprise (and further irritation) she seemed pleased. "What?"

"You're showing emotions. That's good." She smiled. "Come on, Squall, don't make me do all the work, you have to have something you've wanted to ask me, right?"

Squall hesitated, picking at a stray thread on his bed. It was true, he had plenty of questions for her. But he was sitting with the very person whose departure had caused his trust issues in the first place. He knew that it was a petty reason to not trust in people, that Ellone hadn't had a choice, but there was too much conditioning in his subconscious to change the way he thought. She must have noticed his solemn expression.

"It's okay, Squall." Ellone said gently. "If you don't want to talk right now, it's fine-"

"No, it's not that." Squall didn't take his eyes off of the thread. "Just…just give me a second." She waited patiently and he took a deep breath. "Did we come to the orphanage together?"

Ellone looked surprised. "Yes, we did. Shortly after…uh, yeah, we were sent to the orphanage." She added unconvincingly.

"What were you going to say?" Squall wanted to know. What was she leaving out?

"Well, it's just that, uh, how do I say this." Ellone struggled with herself, lowering her legs. "I knew your parents."

"So?" Squall might have been curious about his parents early in his childhood, but he had no time to think about them lately. They were dead, so it didn't matter.

"Your mom, she was best friends with my mom." Ellone explained. "My parents died when I was young, they were attacked by wild monsters. Anyways, your mom took me in, raised me as her own child, really."

"Oh." Squall replied lamely. So Ellone wasn't his real sister. Well, that much should have been obvious from the beginning, he supposed. After all, everyone had called her sis…

"Yeah. We were living in a small town back then." She looked down at the floor. "Then, when I was about four, your father wound up in town. He was a wounded Galbadian soldier, and Raine, your mom, was the only one who was willing to look after him.

"And it was love at first sight?" Squall guessed in a mask of indifference. In truth he was interested in what she was saying, but he didn't want to hear too much of it. He'd never given his parents much thought before, and to hear of them and know that they'd once had lives that people remembered…it was scary.

"Kind of." Ellone answered. "I was always pestering Raine about marrying him." Her eyes took on a sad gleam of reminiscence, and Squall wanted to leave. He couldn't deal with other people's emotions. He took another breath and forced himself to stay. He was her body guard, he had no choice.

"But then…Squall, I'm so sorry." Ellone's voice cracked. She still didn't look up at him.

"There's nothing to apologize for. I never knew them." Squall said, finally breaking the thread from his mattress.

"No, it's, I…" She choked, and Squall was unsure of what to do. He looked away from her right as she looked at him. "It's my fault." She whispered miserably.

"Don't be stupid-"

"No." Ellone sat up on her bed, and Squall finally looked up. Tears were running down her face. "I got captured for scientific research because of my powers, and Uncle Laguna went after me." She cried.

"I still don't see-"

"Just listen." She whispered, and Squall nodded, finding it ironic that now she didn't want him to talk. She dabbed at her eyes before continuing. "Raine was all alone. But she was so strong willed, she still thought she could do everything on her own, and, and…" Her voice was rising in pitch, and she took a shuddering breath. "One day she fell down a set of stairs. It was a long time before anyone could find her, they thought she was going to lose you," She sniffed, and though Squall knew the ending to her story, he didn't want to hear it. "but she managed to stay alive long enough to make sure you were born." Squall was frozen, he couldn't have said anything if he'd wanted to. Why did she think he'd want to know how his mother had died?

"I'm sorry, Squall, if Uncle Laguna hadn't gone after me he would have been with Raine, and he wouldn't have allowed her to do anything on her own. I took everything from you, Squall-"

"Stop-"

"I got to be raised by your parents, and you've never even seen them." She sobbed. "I tried to make it up to you at the orphanage, but I know it's not good enough, it will never replace-" She stopped when Squall got up and hugged her in a motion to quick and unexpected to see coming.

"Just stop." Squall pleaded. She nodded, crying on his shoulder. It was nice, hugging Ellone. He'd forgotten what it felt like, and he knew now, that this was what he'd been missing. She wrapped her thin arms around him.

"I'm sorry…" She cried into his uniform. He didn't say anything, or move for that matter. Just sat in the moment.

Since then, Ellone hadn't taken him to any more memories, which relieved Squall. He didn't like where his life was heading. He had a fear, but he didn't want to dwell on it too much.

"Squall?" Ellone asked again.

"Yeah. I'm ready." _Pay attention!_ He scolded himself as he got up. What was wrong with him? He walked out of the door ahead of Ellone. They left the hotel and walked along the lonely evening sidewalks towards Caraway's Mansion.

_What am I going to ask him…I guess I should start with Julia._ Squall reasoned. If there was no Julia, there'd be no Rinoa. He gazed at the sky, missing the stars' reassurance; the city was too bright to see them. He resisted the urge to sigh as they walked to the front gates.

"Ellone Loire and Squall Leonhart." Ellone told the guard. He nodded, and the gate swung open. Squall's heart was hammering in his chest. He'd finally see her. He knew he'd seen her eyes on that shuttle, she was there. Even Ellone wouldn't be able to deny it when he saw her in the flesh. And she'd been waiting for so long…

A maid opened the door and ushered them to the well furnished living room, and Squall saw that he had no need to ask his first question. There, seated next to Caraway was a refined Julia Heartilly. He stopped in the hallway and Ellone bumped into him. _But she died in a crash when Rinoa was young, going to pick her up from ballet practice…_

"Is there something wrong, Squall?" What was he supposed to do now?

"No, sorry." He muttered, continuing to walk.

"Ah, it's nice to see you again, Mr. Leonhart, Miss Loire." Caraway nodded as he said their names, and they both nodded back. "Please, have a seat." They did, Squall sneaking peeks at Julia whenever he could. He tried to see Rinoa in her, but there was only her hair and skin color. She smiled pleasantly.

"So, Mr. Leonhart," she asked in a soft, musical voice. Not Rinoa. "What can we help you with this evening?" A few seconds passed, and Squall felt like a fool. Ellone put a hand on his arm.

"I was…I just want to know if you know anyone named Rinoa." His breath caught in his throat when he said her name, it'd been so long, and he forgot how much it hurt.

"Well, there was my grandmother." Julia said thoughtfully. "But she's long passed."

"But if you'd had a daughter, you would have named her Rinoa, right?" Squall asked hopefully. Julia glanced at Caraway, but he didn't look in her direction.

"Yes." She said, looking uncomfortable. "But we didn't." Squall couldn't believe what he was hearing. It was like something had shattered inside of him. How could they not have Rinoa?

"Squall, maybe we should go." Ellone whispered. She probably thought Squall would do something rash. Before Squall could gather enough of his senses to answer, the door opened.

"Mom, dad, I'm home." Caraway's mouth tightened very slightly, and Julia smiled.

"Well, I'm sure you both remember Xaiden." Caraway said in forced calm. As he introduced him, a boy around Squall's age walked in. He was pale with jet black hair and straight, pointy teeth. He wore higher-class casual styled clothing, chic and fashionable. Squall lost his breath when he looked into his eyes. Coal black, but blazing with energy. They were her eyes, those were the eyes he'd seen on the shuttle…

"Hi Squall, Elle." He greeted with a grin. "Hey, I heard you whooped that Sorceress' butt, way to go!" He congratulated. "Wish I could have come." He threw an irritated glance at his parents.

"Maybe if you'd trained harder, you would have been adequate." Caraway said, lifting a wine glass to his lips. Xaiden rolled his eyes and Julia gave her husband a disapproving look.

"We should go." Squall announced quietly, standing up. "Thanks for your help." Ellone uttered a thank you, and Squall started to walk out. Though he knew it would hurt, he glanced at Xaiden's eyes, just to see them again. It wasn't her…

"You're going already? Alright, then, bye." Xaiden said as they left. Ellone waved, but Squall didn't dare look at him any more. He rushed out of the house, and Ellone had to jog to keep up with him.

"Squall? Squall, are you okay?" Squall didn't answer, just kept putting one foot in front of the other on the cold cement.

"What did Caraway mean, we'd remember Xaiden?" Squall asked, still not turning towards her. Had to keep moving, if he stopped, he'd lose it.

"We worked with him in Matron's assassination." Ellone answered. Squall slowed down, and she looked relieved.

"Did he go off on his own, try to take her down by himself?" Squall needed to know.

"No." Ellone said, her eyebrows pulling together in confusion.

"Did he go to any other missions with us?" Squall asked almost desperately. There had to be some mistake, Rinoa had to exist, in some way or another.

"No, Squall, are you okay?" She repeated. He whirled around on the pavement, and she backed away.

"How could I be okay?" He asked, his steely eyes locking onto hers.

"Squall, I'm just trying to help." Ellone argued. "You know it's Time Compression, but you don't want to do anything to help yourself."

"That's the thing, Ellone, everyone says it's just Time Compression, but someone disappeared!" The few people on the street stared as they passed, some crossing to the other side, but Squall didn't care.

"What else do you need to see, Squall?" Ellone asked, hurt. "Where else do you need to go?"

"I don't want to go anywhere."

"Because you know I'm right, don't you?" Ellone shot. "You know that all evidence will point to-"

"Just-" Squall was about to say shut up, but he refrained. Composure was essential if he was to get away from her. He sighed. "I'm sorry, it's just hard." Ellone sucked in her lip, nodding. "When we get back, can you just show me when we met Xaiden?"

"Why?"

"It will help." Squall insisted. "Please."

Looking like that was the last thing she wanted to do, she finally nodded. "Okay. If it will help you."

End Chapter


	6. The Truth

Chapter Six: The Truth

Ellone entered the cold hotel room first, draping her shawl over a chair before seating herself on her bed. She watched Squall walk through the doorframe through worried eyes.

"Are you sure?" She asked again, as if he hadn't made up his mind.

"Positive." He answered, stretching out on his bed. She sighed before laying down and closing her eyes. Squall succumbed to the high pitched ring that filled his senses, waiting to be dragged into a memory.

Squall and Ellone walked into the Caraway Mansion, Squall standing protectively in front of her. His present self had to conceal any bitterness towards the scenario; he had a mission, after all.

"Hey, Squall, long time no see." Zell greeted, jumping up from a couch so he could pace the room. Squall nodded in reply. He could hear various conversations turning to static in the room as he searched for a way out of the memory.

_**"Squall, what are you doing?"**_ Ellone caught on too late. The memory began sliding down from the mansion's ceiling and draining into the floor like slime, leaving Squall in blackness. Ellone was in front of him, glowing blue with her power. Knowing that they were in his memory, he conjured up a memory of being locked into an orphanage room by Seifer and pushed her in. He was surprised that it worked.

"Squall!" Ellone yelled, pounding on the door. A young Seifer laughed on the other side, and Squall opened his eyes to the present.

He glanced over to her bed, and, seeing that she was limp, immediately got up. He ran to her desk, snatching her keys and scowling at the small gunblade charm dangling from it. He grabbed his wallet and gunblade before exiting and walking swiftly but calmly down the stairs.

As he stepped into the hover car, he heard her voice.

_Squall, get back here!_

"No." He answered aloud, shifting the gears until he was airborne. "Don't worry, he'll let you out in a few hours."

_What are you trying to do?_ She asked.

"You wouldn't understand. Just leave me alone." He growled.

_Not until you see the truth._ She snapped coldly, and he could feel the buzz screaming in his head.

"Are you crazy, I'm driving!" Squall yelled, trying to keep his focus on the expanse of sky before him.

_Just set the coordinates._ Ellone retorted bitterly, but waited for Squall to do so before engulfing him.

"Squall…" Squall looked away from his junction screen and was surprised to see Ellone sitting so close. He fought back any emotion that might have colored his face.

"You shouldn't be so close." Was all he said, and she pouted.

_I don't want to see this…_

"Why?" She asked, tilting her head to the side. He resisted the urge to reach out and touch the soft hair that fanned out as she did so.

"If something were to happen now, I wouldn't have the room to maneuver properly." Ellone snorted.

"Oh, please, you'd get up with those reflexes of yours and take down whatever was in your way."

"I might hit your head in the process." He replied, turning back to his screen.

"That would be fine."

"Ellone, we can't do this." He said robotically.

"Why not?" she demanded, snapping his screen shut.

_Because it's sick…_

"It's unprofessional." Squall answered. "You're my client, my job is to protect you. If I grew more of an attachment, I'd get mad when you were in danger. If I was mad when trying to defend you, I'd get sloppy, and chances are we wouldn't make it." Ellone squinted at him.

"That doesn't make any sense." She said, shaking her head.

"It makes sense." Squall insisted.

"No, it doesn't make sense that if you really feel something really strongly, you try to deny yourself for the sake of your job." Ellone said.

"If you haven't forgotten, your life is my job."

"Maybe I don't care." she muttered moodily.

"Ellone, don't be-"

"Squall." She cut him off, placing her hand on his. Even with his glove, the contact was too much, but he couldn't pull away. He was paralyzed by her touch. He knew he had to tell her no, he had to push her off. But he didn't want to. Slowly, she slid her hands up his arms, stopping at his elbows to embrace his body. She looked up at him, and he couldn't look away from her lips.

"Don't do this to yourself, Squall." She whispered. Squall watched as her lips came closer and closer, panic and expectation eating away at him until finally they were on his lips. He couldn't fight it anymore. And it felt so good.

_Squall screamed, ripping through the memory. It was disgusting, it was wrong, she wasn't Rinoa! He wouldn't do that, not when he was with Rinoa, he wouldn't ever betray her like that. He was sorry, so sorry…_

Squall woke up screaming. He was still strapped in the seat of Ellone's car, and it was gliding smoothly towards his destination. He couldn't sense any trace of Ellone. He guessed she must have drained herself of all energy. Good.

He touched his lips, repulsed that he could still feel her on him. He wiped at his lips, trying to get the feeling off, but he couldn't.

He thought of nothing the entire time that he flew, and when he saw the orphanage he almost sighed in relief. He parked and hopped out of the car, not noticing anything wrong until he came to the tattered entrance of the lighthouse.

Abandoned. Read a sign that had been nailed to the door. That was right, Edea had been killed, so Cid must have relocated. Not that Squall could blame the man, he knew exactly how he was feeling. Except that feeling would end soon.

Squall walked around the ruined house, towards the backyard he remembered so vividly. He talked to himself as he walked.

"Remember, we said we'd meet here if we ever got lost?" He said, stepping over a rock. "I'm sorry it took me so long, I don't know why I didn't think of coming here first." He opened a rickety gate and stepped into the meadow, eyes scanning for a slim figure. There was nothing.

"Rinoa?" He called, refusing to give up. He walked on the dead grass, past the wilted flowers and towards the house. "Rinoa!" The wind seemed to get colder, harsher with mockery.

"Where are you?" He asked desperately, eyes still restless in their attempt to find her. The truth finally hit him. She was just a spell, like she herself and Ultimecia had said. No matter how long he looked or how hard he tried, he'd never find her. Just like that kiss with Ellone, he couldn't reject the truth any longer. But he still loved her, not Ellone. He took one last look at the meadow, their spot, before walking back out the way he'd come.

"I still have one more option, then." He muttered, slamming the Ellone's door shut once he'd made it inside. He set the coordinates for the Sorceress Memorial.

End Chapter

**A/N: I know, a very short chapter, but the length felt right for this one. Show that you care and review, please, as I've become a brat upon turning 18, and decided that I won't update until I get three reviews (Not a lot to ask for considering I had 6 on the first chapter). The end is near, after all. I think this story only has about two or three more chapters left.**

**P.S: For those who read and enjoyed _The Quistis Effect, _there is a poll regarding that story in my profile.**


	7. A Siren's Kiss

Chapter Seven: A Siren's Kiss

Squall swooped down in tight circles, coming to an abrupt stop outside of the Sorceress Memorial. He ran past the lab, and memories of saving Rinoa sprung to his mind, every detail vivid and painful in his lonely mind. Something seemed to tear at the inside of his chest, clawing at his heart as he pushed them all away from him. He stopped, panting when he came to the list of Sorceresses on the side wall.

_Where is she?_ Squall thought, eyes feverishly roaming the list. He stood there for an endless amount of time, the wind whipping through his hair and chilling his bones. He searched the list again and again, but he could find nothing.

"Can I help you with something, sir?" Squall turned to see a young scientist nervously waiting for a response. How long had he been watching?

"Yeah, do you know if the sorceress Edea was sent to Tear's Point?" Squall asked, mustering all the sanity he had left. The boy looked confused.

"No, I'm sorry. She was assassinated, remember?" He asked slowly, probably knowing that Squall had killed her. Squall took a deep breath.

"What about Adel? Or Ultimecia?" The scientist shook his head, looking just a little scared.

"All deceased, sir." He answered. His foot twitched as if he wanted to leave.

"Is there any burial ground for sorceresses?"

"They're given regular burials, if their bodies can be found." The boy recalled, brow furrowed.

"So they wouldn't be at Tear's Point." Squall muttered more to himself than the boy. The boy nodded, and Squall glanced at the list of names on the wall. "But there's plenty of other sorceresses."

"Is there something wrong-" Squall walked away before the boy could finish asking. He looked down when he ascended in Ellone's car, but the boy was gone. Squall hoped that the boy wouldn't report anything.

_That would be ridiculous._ Squall reassured himself. _Even if he did, there wouldn't be anything that they could do in time._ Nothing was going to stop him.

It was dusk by the time Squall reached Tear's Point. He got out of the car, his knees shaky and his heart pounding. He kept looking above and behind him as he walked, just in case Ellone or someone else was headed his way. He hated being paranoid, hated that this was what his life had been reduced to.

Tear's Point was just as secluded as it ever was. He stared at row upon row of frozen sorceresses as he made his way to the middle of them all. There was an eerie energy about the place that Squall hadn't noticed before, a power that pulled at all of his fears and desires. He took a deep breath, uneasy among the frozen women.

"Well," Squall challenged once he was in the center of all of the sorceresses. "You got what you wanted, Ultimecia. You win, I just want her back." His words were met with a mocking silence. He clenched his fists, standing straight and lifting his head in anger. "I'll release any sorceress that can bring her back to me!" He yelled, and the energy of the place increased. The silence stretched in his eardrums until it broke, and suddenly hundreds of voices were calling for attention in his head.

**Release me, young knight. **A slow, seductive voice suggested. Squall saw the middle aged woman directly in front of him, and somehow knew the voice belonged to her. **I'll give you anything you desire.**

**Ha, you can't take her seriously.** Squall matched the voice with a girl around his age frozen to the right. Her expression was defiant in her sleepless slumber. **She doesn't know how to give you what you need. You want the dream girl? It's only too easy for me. **Squall began walking towards her, blocking out all of the other voices, until a particularly strong voice cut through.

**Don't listen to them!** A young voice called. Curious, Squall left the teen and headed to the source, trying to push all of the greedy voices away. He stopped in front of a young girl, no older than ten with thick, curly hair and a frown forever etched on her face.

**They'll corrupt you, and if that girl really loved you, she wouldn't want that!** Squall laughed at her in a cruel, insane way.

"You've read too many fairy tales." He spat. He almost felt bad, staring into that eternally sad face, but he couldn't bring himself to care about anyone but Rinoa.

**There's another way, if you really need to see her.** The girl's voice told him.

**She's lying! **A nasty chorus of voices accused. Their anger was enough reason for Squall to believe the girl.

"What is it?" Squall asked, and the other sorceresses began yelling again.

**They say that a siren's kiss can bring anything one desires.** The girl answered.

"Sorry, but I don't think that's much of a help." Squall said impatiently. He didn't even have Siren junctioned to him, she was probably Seifer's…

**But you've met her already.** The girl answered, and he could feel her sifting through his memories. He shivered as she passed through his thoughts. **See, here.** She brought up the image of the girl with sunglasses that he'd seen in Deling.

"Her? She's a siren?" By then all of the other voices had faded from Squall's mind, it was much easier to hear the young sorceress.

**She can explain it to you.** The girl replied drowsily. **I'm running out of energy, I'm afraid…**Squall felt her presence drift with her voice, and soon found himself alone again. He walked up to her, reading her name.

_Anita Kadowaki._ He stumbled backwards when he recognized her name, and he wanted to scream. How much of his life was a lie? Looking into her face now, he could recognize her. He ran away before he could think about it anymore.

_The siren._ He thought as he ran for the car. _I'll just get to the siren, and it'll all be over. It'll finally be over…_Squall hoped it would be, he couldn't take anymore. He never wanted to see Ellone again, or any other of his 'friends' for that matter. He just wanted to see Rinoa, even if it killed him.

It was well past midnight by the time Squall had made it back to Deling, but somehow, he knew he'd find the girl. He parked far away from the hotel, and though the streets were empty, he was alert; he was not going to be stopped by Ellone when he was so close. His eyes were restless, and his arm twitched towards his gunblade at the slightest of sounds.

"Somebody's jumpy!" Squall jumped at the loud cheery voice and whirled to see the girl sitting at a small circular table outside of a closed café, inspecting her fingernails. Though it was dark, she was still wearing her sunglasses.

"You," Squall said, walking up to her. "You're a-"

"Sit." She said easily, not looking up from her hand. Sitting down was the last thing Squall wanted to do, but he obeyed her, taking the seat across from her. "So, someone squealed, huh?"

"A sorceress." Squall answered shortly. The girl grunted.

"Well, aren't you curious about how I'm walking around instead of hiding out in some lair, waiting to be conquered?" She asked, finally looking up at him.

"I don't care." Squall replied truthfully. He didn't care about anything but Rinoa…

"How rude." She scolded, clicking her tongue. "I'll tell you anyways, Squall. My name is Selene, and I'm the daughter of the GF siren. I'm supposed to take over her lair and wait for humans to challenge me, but…" She shrugged indifferently. "It's not my thing.

"Now before you get impatient, I'm sure whichever little sorceress told you about me told you that I have to kiss you for you to get what you want, right?" She asked, pulling out a tube of lipstick. Squall fought back a grimace as she brought it to her lips.

"Yeah."

"And do you know what you want, what you _really_ want?" She took off her sunglasses, and the world dimmed all around her, hideous in comparison to her beauty. Her eyes were a solid gold, gleaming ethereally in the night. Squall was lost in her astonishing beauty, he wanted to do anything for her, even die for her.

"You can have anything you want, Squall." She whispered huskily. Her features morphed until he was staring at Rinoa. "I'll give you anything." Before Squall could give into his temptations, he grabbed her by her slender neck, and she began to choke. Her delusion fell all around her.

"You listen to me, _Selene_." Squall hissed through his teeth. Tears were starting to run down her cheeks as she gasped for air. "I am not going to be toyed with, I love one girl and only one girl, is that _clear_?" She nodded vigorously, and he let her go. She coughed for a few minutes, trying to compose herself.

"You love someone that doesn't exist, but whatever." She spat, rolling her eyes. "I just wanted to let you know, Squall, everything has a price."

"Whatever it is, I can pay it." Squall said curtly. Selene raised an eyebrow.

"Well, let me just tell you, then. To get you to your little friend, I'll just be sending your soul to a plane of existence in your mind. I, however, need memories to feast on."

"Eat as much as you want, I don't care." Squall said.

"Do you understand, Squall, that when we kiss, it will be just like junctioning a GF?"

"I thought you weren't like other GFs?" Squall asked. She motioned for him to get up, and he did.

"I just don't want to go through all of the fighting to exist. I still need human memories; I've been living off of passersby in the city." She told him as they walked around the corner. "Now, you realize that you're giving me permission to keep you alive with my magic, so I can feed off of you for your entire lifespan?"

"I don't care." Squall repeated. That just meant that he had a lifetime with Rinoa. He felt bitter remembering that Ultimecia had offered him an eternity… "Wait, where are we going?" Squall couldn't believe how scatterbrained he had become.

"Relax, we're going to my house." Selene said. "Don't worry, I'll keep you in a nice room." Squall couldn't care less. He was finally going to see her, nothing else mattered. A feeling of elation entered him, and he was happy for the first time since he'd seen Rinoa.

They entered a large house not too far from Caraway's Mansion, and Selene led him up to a room on the top floor. It was a big room with a high ceiling, red with white accents. She crawled onto the queen sized bed, motioning for him to lay next to her. He did, figuring she didn't want to have to pick him up when he left.

"Are you sure you can do this?" she asked him, something close to concern in her golden eyes.

"Yeah, I've never been more sure." She sighed before closing her eyes and leaning towards him. He told himself it was for Rinoa before leaning in and pressing his lips on hers.

End Chapter

**A/N: Well, what do you think will happen? Will he really go to Rinoa? Who is he going to end up with? How will this all end? Really, I want to know what you guys make of this, it'll help me out. Same deal as last time, 3 reviews. You can all thank Hugh Haiter and SeungSeiRan for reviewing so diligently.**


	8. The Memory of Love

Chapter Eight: The Memory of Love

The last thing Squall had seen before he had closed his eyes was Selene's passionate face. He felt her lips pressing gently onto his, and the poison of her kiss filled him with disgust for a brief second before it was all gone. He couldn't hear or see anything. He was only aware of himself. It was a welcome relief from the horrible chaos he'd had to endure.

Then, suddenly, he was in a pink dominated room. The colors were soft, but warm against the cloudy grey outside of the window. Train tracks rattled below him, and a curious dog regarded him from next to the window.

"Angelo." Squall greeted, kneeling down to pat the dog. She bared her teeth, growling from the back of her throat. There was a threatening gleam in her eyes. Squall retreated, confused. Angelo had always been friendly. Something was wrong.

"Rinoa?" He called. There was no answer. He walked out of the room, leaving Angelo still growling in his direction. It was eerily quiet on the rest of the train. No Zone or Watts or anyone else making plans, like how he remembered. Just the empty clanking of the train. "Rinoa?" He called again.

"I'm in here." Squall turned back towards her room, towards her voice. She was sitting on the edge of her bed, petting Angelo.

It didn't even matter to Squall that she hadn't been there just minutes before, all that mattered was that she was there now. He ran to her, and held her in an embrace. Rinoa hesitated, but gave a stiff hug back. Why wouldn't she hug him like he hugged her?

"Rinoa, what's wrong?" Angelo was barking now, ears pressed to her head and jaws snapping. Rinoa pulled away and chastised the dog before turning back to Squall. She couldn't seem to look at him, and it broke Squall's heart.

"Squall, this is wrong." She whispered. "You know that, right?"

Squall didn't want to hear it. "How can this be wrong, Rinoa?" It couldn't, they were together again. How could that be wrong? Raindrops started to splatter against the window.

"I'm not _real_ Squall. I'm even less than I was before. I'm a _memory of a spell_!" She cried, and her form flickered, along with everything else around him.

"Rinoa, don't, don't!" Squall said desperately, wrapping her in his arms again. She was beautifully solid. "I don't care if you're not real, I love you!" He became scared at that moment, remembering how she had disappeared after he told her he loved her before. But she remained in his arms. She leaned her head on his chest, and he took in a breath.

"Do you know how I was created, Squall?" Her voice was soft, flowing with the silence around them.

"It doesn't matter." He meant it.

"I was created from your inner wants, your need to be noticed, to be helped." Rinoa said softly, her arms wrapping around his body. "Ultimecia found all of the holes in your soul and tried to make me able to fill them."

"It worked, didn't it?" Squall asked, giving her a loving squeeze. He didn't want to let her go, he wouldn't…

"Squall, it's like…it's like filling a pothole." Rinoa explained. He wondered if she was listening to his heartbeat grow faster. "You have to fill it with something sturdy, something that will last and make the road safe again. I'm not sturdy, Squall. I'm just dust, about to be scattered in the wind."

"You're all I need." Squall tried to tell her. She shook her head.

"Let me finish." She said glumly. "Ellone was something sturdy, like concrete. But she couldn't fill all of your holes." Squall nodded, bitter with the sound of her name in his ears. "But that's because she was helping you to fill the rest on your own. And you were. Until I came along and messed it all up for you." She choked at the end of her sentence, and all Squall could do was hold her tighter. The pink room morphed around them, and they were standing at Balamb's secret spot beneath a vast sky of twinkling stars. It was still raining.

"You didn't. You didn't mess everything up. Everything is right when I'm with you." He said, and Rinoa sobbed.

"It's not, Squall!" She finally broke away from him, pleading with her sad eyes. "Can't you see that? You're going to just lay in that awful bed, in a coma for the rest of your life, and for what? Something that's not real, something that can't even love you back!" Something fell in Squall's chest. He didn't know what it was, but it was heavy, and it hurt. Is that what it felt like when your heart exploded, its blood splattering against your insides? Must be.

"You," Squall started slowly, numbly. "Don't love me?" It didn't register in his mind, as if someone had told him he wasn't him anymore. It just couldn't be true.

"How can I? I'm not real." As the words passed her lips, the background again shifted, and they were standing in that lonely gray place with the heavy, iron clouds. The raindrops came down harder, and soon they were both soaked.

"But you're supposed to be what I want, what I need." The words slipped lifelessly from his mouth. Rinoa shook her head. The air got colder.

"I am what you knew me to be. This is what the girl for you would say, if she was in this position. This is what Ellone would say if she were me."

"Would you stop? Ellone isn't for me, you are!" Squall yelled. Wasn't this supposed to be perfect, everything he ever wanted? Flowers were sprouting from the dry earth, beautiful in their color. They rose and blossomed unnaturally before withering into weeds beneath them.

"Stop it, Squall." Rinoa said, tears running down her delicate face. How could she not love him, to cry like that? "You can't do this."

"I already did." He retorted. The flowers curled up, away from them.

"I can't let you." She whispered, clinging to the rings at her neck. She looked at them longingly, wanting them to really be hers. But she knew they weren't. "Don't worry, Selene will take me away from you."

"No." Squall felt cold, colder than ice and hollow. "No, Rinoa, please, don't do this."

"I am nobody, Squall." She said, taking off the necklace and holding it out to Squall. "Nobody." She held his gaze for a few seconds, but, seeing that he wasn't going to take the jewelry, dropped it to the floor. It sunk into the cracked ground, dragging the rest of the floor into its direction, pulling Squall towards it. He ran, but soon there was nowhere to run, and he sunk into the floor. "People don't fade, but memories do."

And suddenly he was back in Galbadia, with an icicle sticking out of his shoulder. But it was different. He couldn't hear Edea's horrible laughter, wasn't aware of the raging crowd beneath him. The pain was a thousand times worse than he remembered it being, and for some reason, it was all in his heart. He fell backwards, wildly grasping for something, anything to pull himself back up. But there was nothing, and this time Rinoa didn't run to the edge. There was only black skies above him as he plummeted.

Someone was screaming in the distance, an awful, tortured noise. Tears rolled down the corners of Squall's eyes, and he realized that the horrible screaming was coming from his own throat. He did nothing to stop it.

"What's wrong? What's going on? Oh my god, it's not supposed to be like this!" Selene's voice was panicking very far away, still nothing in comparison to his excruciating pain. There was a weight lifted from his head, and then a different kind of screaming.

_How could she say she loves me…and then leave me?_

Everything was black. It was quieter, now, but Squall didn't want to move. If he could just rot where he lay, that would be just fine. It would prove her wrong, prove that he _did_ need her. But someone was crying, shaking the bed and disturbing his peace. He slowly opened his eyes, staring blankly ahead at the bland ceiling. There was rain softly falling on the roof. He turned his head, his bangs falling over his face as he did so. He could see Selene sobbing through the breaks in his hair. She saw him and straightened out of her huddled position, just gazing at him.

"I took away all I could." She explained shakily. "Your memories of pain." She elaborated, tears streaking down her face. "It wasn't enough, though, was it?"

Squall contemplated that. He could feel the difference, there was less pain and more of a numbness, as if he were separate from the whole problem, no longer a victim, but a witness.

"Can you take it all away?" Squall asked.

"What do you mean by all? Rinoa?" Squall shook his head.

"No. Both of my lives. The fake one that I remember and the real one that I don't." Squall replied, starting to sit up. Selene was quiet for a few minutes.

"You don't want to keep what's real?" She asked, the tears still thick.

"No." Ellone was disgusting to him. Love would never be the same for him, even if he did forget Rinoa. He was changed.

"You're not even going to try to remember it?" The siren accused.

"No. The best thing for me would be to start over, to no longer be me." Squall answered. "We still have a deal, right? You still want my memories."

"I could go with you?" She asked in disbelief. Squall shrugged.

"I wouldn't have much of a choice." He said. She looked tempted, and Squall was sure she would accept the new deal.

"I'll make you another deal, Squall Leonhart." Selene started, wiping her eyes on a corner of the blanket. "I'll take away everything you want me to, if you go back and tell Ellone." Squall looked away, off the edge of the bed.

"I can't do that."

"Then I won't help you." Selene said. She wiped at the mascara that had stained down her cheeks, but it wouldn't come off. "What I'd be doing would be huge, and painful." She tugged on his jacket, and he looked at her. "I feel whatever I take. It's the price I have to pay for a physical form."

Squall didn't care that it would have hurt. Wasn't she going to take it all anyways if he had stayed within his own mind? He sighed, trying to expel the hollowness from inside. Nothing.

"Fine. I'll tell her." Squall finally answered. Selene nodded and stood.

"We should get going, then." She said, looking as tormented as he was.

End Chapter

**A/N: I think next chapter will be the last, although I might decide to add an alternate ending. Please let me know what you thought, and constructive criticism is always welcome.**


	9. Feathers

Chapter Nine: Feathers

Squall operated Ellone's hover car, trying to ignore the long, unblinking stare that the young siren directed at him. _The last thing I need is another stupid romance gone wrong…_He thought moodily. But after more than five minutes of staring, not even Squall could stand it anymore.

"Is there something wrong?" he asked, his tone suggesting that he didn't care if there was.

"I guess I just don't understand humans at all." she answered. "You're so willing to throw away something perfectly good, just because you've deluded yourself-"

"I don't care." Squall interrupted her, and she stopped talking. But she didn't stop staring at him.

Squall was surprised to find that he was nervous. Despite what he told himself about Rinoa, there was still a place in his heart for Ellone.

_It's okay, Squall. I'm here._ Ellone told him in a recent memory. But he could see a memory of himself at the orphanage, too, running around in search of his missing Sis. And in the back of his mind, blurred as if she were standing behind frosted glass, was Rinoa looking on sadly, unable to reach him.

_I don't want to think anymore._ Squall focused on his driving, not wanting to put up with his fragmented mind.

He parked exactly where Ellone had parked, in front of Deling Hotel. He was sure that she was still there. He wondered if Selene would stay in the car, but she was already out, long legs walking towards the hotel.

"Come on, Squall." She called is if he needed to be told. He followed.

_This is it._ Squall thought as he ascended the polished staircase. _This is the end._

Ellone was waiting for him when he opened the door. She was sitting on the edge of her bed, her eyes red and puffy, and she couldn't help but look relieved when he entered. Her face fell when she saw Selene. He could read it on her face, it was as if all of her nightmares had crashed down on her.

"Who's she?" Ellone asked in an unwelcoming tone. Selene fidgeted, and Squall stepped in front of her.

"It doesn't matter." Squall said. It felt like there was jelly in his chest, it was hard to breathe and focus. "I remember everything." It was a lie, he couldn't remember everything, but he remembered enough. He made sure that his tone left no hope for her, that it was clear that his recollection of their time together changed nothing.

"And?" she asked cautiously, still hoping despite his coldness.

"I can't be with you." he made himself look at her, he would not be so weak as to avoid her gaze. Her eyes spoke visions of isolation, of worry and sorrow. She was crushed, broken, and alone. And a part of her already resented him for it.

"Why?" she forced the word from herself, not wanting to know the answer but needing to all the same.

"Because I still remember Rinoa." he said quietly, and a dull pain hammered against his soul. Rinoa, the girl that no one remembered. Rinoa, who only had Squall to care about her.

"So, you're just going to…" Whatever she suspected, she wasn't able to articulate.

"I'm leaving. I'm going to erase my memories completely, so don't look for me, because I won't know you." He said it slowly, making sure she understood. She sat quietly, letting the meaning sink in.

"You're serious, aren't you?" Ellone asked him, finally letting go of any hope she'd held on to.

"Yes." He whispered. He'd never been more serious. She bowed her head.

"Well, I have something to tell you, too." she said, and thick tears fell from her eyes to the carpet. "I'm going to be frozen. I'm not labeled as malevolent, not yet, but I've caused enough damage, and I'm dangerous enough to be considered a threat." Squall didn't know how to argue with that. She hadn't directly caused trouble, but she'd always be targeted for her abilities.

"I don't think you should." he said, still wanting her to be okay. Why couldn't she just move on?

"You don't have the right to care about me. It's not your business anymore." Ellone said, her voice close to cracking.

"I've been messed up from Time Compression." Squall told her. "I'm messed up more than anyone could imagine. Don't voluntarily mess up your life."

"I'm going, Squall, but I'll do it after you're gone, so you won't care when you hear about the Sorceress being frozen on the news." Ellone said, and her voice did crack. He remembered, then, the promise he'd made to Rinoa.

_Even if the whole world is against you…I'll be your knight._ He wished that somebody had made the same promise to Ellone, that she'd have somebody to fall back on.

"Don't do this, Ellone." Squall pleaded.

"Then don't leave me." she cried. Squall sighed. He really didn't want to leave, he didn't want her to be frozen. But he didn't love her, and in the end, it would all be a lie. What was he supposed to do?

Selene crossed the room silently, sitting close to Ellone. She tilted the older girl's head up, and, very gently, kissed her on the lips. Ellone gasped, struggled against it, but eventually gave in to the painless state. She slumped over.

"What did you do?!" Squall asked. Selene gently lowered Ellone, fresh tears streaming down her face.

"There," she said, her voice shaky. "now she won't remember you, either." She tried to stand but fell to the floor, trembling with the emotional pain. He pulled her up, and she clung to him, sobbing on his shoulder.

"You're so selfish!" she yelled, and he didn't know if it was Ellone's emotions or her own conclusion. But she didn't let go of him.

"Come on." Squall carried her out of the hotel room, not looking back at the sleeping Ellone. He placed her key on the drawer on his way out.

He wandered through the dark streets of Deling, searching for Selene's house. He was haunted by images of Ellone and Rinoa, both distressed. One had wanted him to stay, the other had wanted him to leave. It hurt to think about them, and he pushed them from his mind.

_Just forget it all._ He told himself. He walked up the path to Selene's house, opening the unlocked door and putting her in the only room he recognized.

The bright shelves and paintings seemed to leer down at him, mocking him in his desperation. There was a heavy expectancy in the atmosphere, as if something big were about to happen. It all seemed to still, too out of place with his situation. Or was he the one out of place?

"To forget." Squall leaned his head back, and his words lingered in the air, adding to the heaviness of the room. "That's all I want." He crawled onto the bed, his face hovering over Selene's. Her face morphed subtly, and soon is was as if someone had pasted two transparent pictures of Ellone and Rinoa above Selene's face.

Still refusing to close his eyes and hide, he slowly kissed her, and he felt a part of him fade into numbness. He looked up, and all around the room were people he thought knew and people he didn't remember knowing.

Seifer, Quistis, Selphie, Irvine, Zell, Creed, Xaiden, Laguna, Ellone and Rinoa. They all looked down on him, their faces impassive.

"Goodbye." Squall told them, leaning in for another kiss. Another part of him was lost, and when he looked up again, only Ellone and Rinoa remained. He couldn't remember the people who were missing.

He again returned to Selene, kissing her for longer than he had previously dared to. When he glanced over, only Rinoa remained. She held out a hand to him, her eyes hurt. Feathers erupted from around her, twirling gracefully before laying still on the floor. Memories of those he'd forgotten stirred within him, and he knew it was his last chance to turn back. He shook his head, and noticed that the feathers disappeared when he went in for another kiss.

He kissed her again and again, but every time he looked up, Rinoa stood before him, stained into his memory. Tears began clouding his vision, and he finally gave up, laying down next to the siren.

"Enough." he murmured. "Enough is enough." Selene stirred next to him, and struggled to open a golden eye. She nodded slightly, dragging herself to him. She kissed him, slowly but passionately, and during that time, Rinoa faded from the room. A single white feather was left on the floor.

***

"I'll be back later, Uncle Laguna, don't wait up for me!" Ellone called over her shoulder as she grabbed her purse.

"Going to meet Xaiden?" Laguna asked playfully. Ellone blushed, and he spared her the embarrassment of admitting it. "Just have fun." She beamed and rushed out of the door.

The second the door clicked close behind her, Laguna let the smile slip off of his face. Two months ago Ellone had been found alone in her hotel room, dazed, but unharmed. She was convinced that she'd gone to Deling to visit Xaiden, but she couldn't remember any of the last few days.

She also had no recollection of Laguna's son.

Squall had been nowhere in sight, Laguna had men searching the corners of the earth for him. It was as if he'd faded from the world when he'd faded from Ellone's memory.

Somehow he knew that no matter how hard he looked, he would never see his son again. But he was convinced that Squall had been a victim, taken hostage by a Sorceress' cruel tricks. He walked over to his desk and pulled open a drawer, which hid the only picture that existed of himself with Squall. He simply held the picture close, trying to feel comfort from it, before stowing it out of sight again. He would never stop missing his son.

End Story

**A/N: Probably the most dissatisfying ending I've ever written. I tried for a long time to angle the story towards a better ending, but I couldn't. I'm sorry. **

**And I never thought I'd write a girl-on-girl kiss, but I've received only insightful and mature reviews so far, so I don't think I'll get such bad reviews for that. Maybe for this chapter, but that's another story. I almost wrote a scene with Selene and Squall living in Shumi village, with Squall still keeping the feather, but it didn't quite fit. Again, sorry. I hope that this was at the very least interesting, if not well crafted or satisfying.**

**As a side note, I've posted the first chapter for my sequel to the **_**Quistis Effect**_**, called **_**The S Factor.**_** Thank you for the support.**


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